Lee Kenny: Taking things back to basics with your business

The rumour-mill is in full flow that Yorkshire water are due to announce a hosepipe ban next week, though the official word from them is quite different. It might be my imagination, but I seem to recall times when after months of rain, just 3 days of weather above 25 degrees was enough for the threat of a water restrictions to be imposed!

So what wonders of modern technology or algorithms are responsible for our seemingly endless supply of “corporation pop”? Well it seems good old-fashioned advice has done the trick. Yorkshire Water asked people to try and be responsible and use less water and it seems to have done the trick. Going back to basics, some might say.

Back to Basics

Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, Medium, Twitter, Twitch, YouTube, artificial intelligence, virtual reality, experiential marketing, QR codes. The list goes on and on when discussing what clever methods can be used to reach potential customers. However sometimes you just need to go back to the basics.

A few years ago, a health professional asked my company to help them with a social media strategy to reach the physio or coaches for the main sporting clubs in the area. Our advice? Find out what night training was for each team, get in the car and go introduce yourself. Not as sexy as a lovely online campaign, but probably 10 times more effective.

Start with the right questions

Who is your ideal customer? What problems do they have that you can solve? What’s the best or easiest way to reach them? Does your solution offer good value that makes you a profit while returning an even greater profit for the customer? There is no “one-size fits all” in the marketing field, so be sure to communicate what you stand for and why people should care.

Maximise your customer lifetime value

They say it’s easier to sell to an existing customer than to find a new one. That’s true to a certain extent, as long as you a) look after the customer well and exceed their expectations b) Have more than one product or service to offer and c) Have a process in place to make the process work.

Decide what makes you different

If you are to avoid a race to the bottom in terms of cost and profitability, then you need to work out what’s so special about you and your business. The worst 2 answers to this question are service & experience. Both these 2 things are important, but there will usually be someone who either has better service or more years in the industry. Take some time away from the business to work out what your “edge” could be. Knowing these answers will help you craft a marketing message that cuts through the noise of the market place and will help you beat the competition

Lee Kenny is Managing Director at The Snowflake Media Group @SocialSnowflake

MORE COLUMNS

Lee Kenny: A beginners’ guide to the world of WordpressLee Kenny: Objective Omnipresence - various methods to raise your profileBusiness column: Lee Kenny looks at the many challenges faced by entrepreneurs